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5 Social Media Lessons from Donald Trump

Despite the controversy surrounding him, Donald Trump is internationally known as a real estate magnate, best selling author, shrewd businessman and “The Apprentice” host. His net worth is $3.2 Billion, according to Forbes.

What many don’t know about Mr. Trump however, is the many challenges he had to face in order to taste success: unfortunate incidents like the loss of his executive team in a helicopter crash, or major bankruptcy. Believe it or not, we can learn a LOT of social media lessons from him…despite recent missteps!)

Ups and downs, the wins and the failures, where nothing but the architectural factors for building the brand he is today – TRUMP.

If you’ve read at least one of his books like “The Art of the Deal” or “How to Get Rich“, you’ll start to realize what kept Donald in business… it’s the passion and sheer determination to compete in the marketplace, close deals, and become better on a daily basis, rather than the profit itself.

Imagine you had the once in a lifetime opportunity to sit down and talk with Mr. Donald Trump for 10 minutes about life, business and branding. Priceless, you’d say, right?

Not many can have this chance though, of course. At least we have the Internet, which is freely available 24/7. So, I went ahead, and immersed myself (for days) into web research mode. I almost went nuts.

What I’ve found in my journey is incredible. Real life lessons we can adjust and fit into our own business (for social media success) just like kids playing Lego. Some connections are evident, others require a shift in perspective – looking at things from new angles has its merits.

Let’s go through some inspiring quotes which I’ve found through my research and the social media lessons we can apply for our business, as a result.

Social Media Lesson 1: Just Start

“Get going. Move forward. Aim High. Plan a takeoff. Don’t just sit on the runway and hope someone will come along and push the airplane. It simply won’t happen. Change your attitude and gain some altitude. Believe me, you’ll love it up here.” — Donald Trump

Are you an early adopter?

I remember when I first heard about Facebook, many years ago. I thought to myself that I wouldn’t jump on that bandwagon anytime soon. Years later, and now I have no other option but to integrate this platform as part of my core business. That’s where my competitors are. That’s where clients swim. I’d be a fool to neglect this amazing pond.

I truly believe that you don’t have to wait for the perfect time to start with social media and why “learning everything” is not the key in business. You’ll learn new things along the way, all the time anyway, so the best time to start is now. Make “postponing” part of the history.

Social Media Lesson 2: Leverage Momentum

“When luck is on your side it is not the time to be modest or timid. It is the time to go for the biggest success you can possibly achieve.” — Donald Trump, Think Big

I cannot emphasize enough the importance of guest posting!

Small and big firms alike are taking the web by storm with this method. An article can go viral without your effort – but that’s a very rare occasion, and you can never count on it happening. You have to be there, on the front line, and promote your guest post as hard as possible, once it gets live. One viral post can make a huge difference in your traffic and conversions for weeks and months to come, so once you hit the sweet spot of a post that really resonates with readers, leverage that momentum.

One of the best ways to do that is to outsource some of your work. Putting together a team of enthusiasts about your work, who will always be interested in commenting and sharing your posts is a powerful way to do that. How do you get these enthusiasts? By engaging with readers on your blog and in your email list and through your guest posts, of course! That’s the work you have to put in if you expect a post to go viral. That is exactly happened with my article on blog commenting. It got 51 comments and counting, not to mention the social media snowball effect it pulled in. I was able to leverage this into attention for my other posts, and I now have skilled writers and social media enthusiasts working for my business, while I spend (lots more) precious time with family and kids.

Outsourcing some of your engagement helps you multiply your time, boost your revenue and zip to success like an Air Force pilot.

Social Media Lesson 3: Bullet-Proof Your Accounts

“My Twitter has been seriously hacked— and we are looking for the perpetrators.” — Donald Trump via Twitter

How safe are your social media accounts?

Having a social media account (or any other kind!) can wreck havoc with your reputation – it’s not a risk you want to be taking when avoiding it is so easy!

Here are some easy yet often neglected tips to help you keep (hackers and any other intruders) away from accessing or prejudicing your social media accounts (and business).

1. Use unique passwords for each account. Don’t worry about remembering them. There are tools for that. Most people don’t want to use such, and they create easy to crack passwords at their own peril. The ones making excuses, obtain loses, and have no one to blame but themselves.

2. When creating passwords, insert numbers (0-9), and special characters ($, _, #, @), not just words, and make each password at least 8 characters long, preferable 12 and up. Another technique is to use a strong of unrelated words – these are very difficult for even computers and software to figure out – if you’d like the math on that, check out this cartoon from XKCD.

3. Password management tools such as LastPass keep track of all of your different passwords for you – they store the information in one secure place, so even if you forget one, you have access to it.

Social Media Lesson 4: Think BIG or Go Home

“You have to think anyway, so why not think big?” — Donald Trump

How daring are your goals?

Most people are used to setting goals. But their goals don’t always match up with the outcomes that they want to achieve. Good alignment between your goals and the steps you’ll take to reach them is critical.

For example, when I started by blog, I made about comments a month on other blogs, and would run about 10 articles to promote a new product or campaign.

After experiencing pretty good results, but not the ones I was looking for, I took it to the next level. I now post 200 blog comments a month and up to 30 guest posts per project.

Here is a sneak peek into my social media calendar. I usually outsource many of the tasks discussed below, which I highly recommend. First of all, ensure you get yourself familiar with these activities before you “train” your team or helpers and enthusiasts to take some of the work off your shoulders. If you’re not at a point where you have a team – just try to devote a regular amount of time to this kind of work!

Daily

Use BufferApp to schedule your social media content in advance. (it can take anywhere between 10 and 60 minutes.)

Comment on new web sites relevant to your niche (it can take anywhere between 10 and 90 minutes.)

Respond to comments on the sites where your guest posts appear (it can take anywhere between 10 and 30 minutes.)

Weekly

Adding new content to bookmarking and content sharing sites. For business related outbound marketing I recommend (and use) BizSugar, Inbound.org, Delicious, and Digg. This is an older technique, but I like it for both sharing my posts, and organizing the different sites I’m engaging on.

Guest post writing and pitching. Each week I send guest post pitches to many blogs in my niche, and write the posts to back them up! (I’ve got a team to help me with this, but you’d be surprised how many you can create on your own.)

I take a look at my Twitter metrics and keep track of how far my tweets are reaching using TweetReach and Topsy.

Monthly

Brand and Niche Monitoring. I use Twitter, Facebook, HootSuite and other similar tools to check out competitors, niche ideas, and mentions of my brand, and products. Always try to respond when someone mentions you! This is how relationships are built.

Yearly

In depth analytics and comparisons. Once a year I analyse my best traffic sources, referrals and overall content metrics. I look at what has performed the best for me, and optimize my activities to reflect what is working. This is a hugely powerful aspect to my business growth. Failing to use analytics and tracking tools is like trying to build a house without wood and nails. Possible – but so much more difficult than it needs to be.

Social Media Lesson 5: Adjust to Succeed

“What separates the winners from the losers is how a person reacts to each new twist of fate.” — Donald Trump

The reality is fierce!

Let’s face it! The online world is filled with real challenges and threats for small businesses, and big brands alike, now more than ever.

That’s because everybody can say good and bad things about you, your site and your company – in a split second.

That doesn’t mean everything we hear on the web is true.

Fact or fiction, the one reading the comment, the blog article, the Tweet or the Facebook post on the wall, generally doesn’t quite know the reality – they’re consuming a small piece of information and making a judgement based upon it.

That’s why it is essential you track your reputation online, and be quick to overcome any issue or objection in regard to your product, service or company. Otherwise, anybody saying anything can damage your brand and harm your business, competitors and clients alike.

Better to prevent a problem than treat one, right?

If you learned at least one key lesson about social media success today, then this article was well worth the read, or maybe it was Donald Trump’s merit. Regardless, I expect you will experience new results from your business as soon as you start implementing the advice herein. Remember, adjust along the way, as a sailor would do on the sea, and you’re on the right track to (your definition of) success.

About John Gibb

John Gibb is a top super affiliate in the health industry and known affiliate marketing addict. Download his free super-affiliate handbook: "The Road to Success" ($197 VALUE) and learn the free methods he used to generate 109 sales in a single day.

18 comments

I feel it’s very important (if you are in business) that you learn from, and follow those have become majorly successful. There is much we can learn from others who are successful. I gave a few example quotes on this article, but I really could on for months with the lessons we can learn from such people (and relate to business online).

I feel the last quote is of vital importance for us as online entrepreneurs. If we can’t adapt and adjust to the ongoing changes, we become dog food! We get eaten up alive; it’s the cold hard truth. However, once you accept the reality and are prepared to adapt and adjust to the latest changes, you can create income streams that may not have even possible before. The sky is the limit for those who work smart, think out of the box – and are prepared to go for it no matter what!

Thanks to Firepole marketing for posting my article, and keep up the fantastic work on your blog here 🙂

I just wanted to add something to your password strategy: For those who do not want to rely on a computerized program to remember your passwords, you can generate a *PaSS(w2$rd7233 that is tough to guess just by randomly picking numbers, symbols and letters and writing it down in a notebook USING PEN AND PAPER (remember those?) AND also by using a different password for each site. Organize yourself so that they appear in alphabetical order, if you like, and REMEMBER to CHANGE your password every few months! I was advised of this a few months ago when I first purchased my computer and joined a bunch of sites… I used a weak password for everything, and the same one for everything until I got educated on password protection! So far, nothing bad has happened! (touch wood…)

I think there are still some people left who prefer the old pen and paper over digital notebooks, so your tips would be much appreciated by them. Regardless, having weak passwords is a sure-fire way for a hacking attach. That’s the main reason why people lose their accounts, not necessarily because they aren’t using the latest technology.

Great stuff. #2 is my favorite far and away. I operate my day, after organizing of course on two proactors of power. Inspiration (which is perishable) and Momentum (the tidal wave of creative, playful focus and productivity)

I love this summary of Trump’s approach to stream-lining business building. Thanks for isolating the mindset into action steps. Great organization to create inspiration and momentum for my Saturday…now time to go cash in on it with a killer guest post!

#1 Just Start resonates with me. So many possible business owners never achieve their own business because they are waiting on the runway for someone else to say; you are now finally ready for takeoff. If that is where someone is stuck, they will probably never get started let alone achieve success.

The beauty of having an online business is that as it evolves, one has the ability to modify and change it. Mine seems to be in constant modification mode lately. A business of any type is comparable to coaching someone on their health, such as losing weight. What works for one person might necessarily not work for another.
The plan has to be modified, but one has to Just Start to find out what works for them and what doesn’t.

Everyone has a dream, the key is making the dream become reality and learning from your failures along the way. Your dream stays a dream when you continue to sit on the runway.

Thanks for writing this John, we all can use a Donald Trump shake-up once in awhile to get us thinking.

I’m glad you found the article inspiring, and thank you for sharing your thoughts on it. I like your business start-up vs. weight loss comparison. More people should align with this way of thinking and adapt their business strategy along the way.

The say people are more afraid of public speaking than death. I’d say, most people are more afraid of “starting” (something) than anything else…

The fear of failure is what keeps most men and women of getting things done, transforming their lives, growing professionally and personally, starting businesses, and so on.

It’s easy to talk about “learning from failures” if you’re a (smart) risk taker or entrepreneur. Most people simply don’t have this drive installed yet, or cannot find the inner motivation to plunge into the business world. They know sharks and lions are waiting for them to come… LOL

You’re so right, he’s a true “never quit” top dog. I recall reading one of his stories… he was talking about a real estate experience, how he had to wait 10 years or so to buy a property, and although time wasn’t his ally, the “never quit” mentality kept him in the game, and finally brought him a few top wins (despite many failures)

If we apply this principle to blogging, it won’t be easy, as most individuals are starting a blog financially stressed, and with no concrete goals or strategies….

I highly recommend people NEVER quit their jobs, and instead work on their blogs for months, if not years, in their extra time.

The secret is to really learn from the best (get reliable coaching and training materials)… you’ll be using proven methods that others have made money with, or got traffic, and build mailing lists, etc. Once you build a sizable income, and have 6x months worth of earnings, you can potentially consider a job shift (and take the freelance route, or start a web business, or whatever)

Blogging takes time, just like anything else — that’s why I never advise clients or students to quit their job and start blogging or whatever. They should do it in their spare time, but keep it consistent for 6 months at least.

Success leaves clues, and mentors do help.

I bet Donald has mentors too; I strongly believe every “Guru” has its own mentor or coach to learn from and take guidance from.

Whether you get one on one coaching or group mentoring, or reading your favorite “gurus” books, that’s still guidance from a specialist you look up for, or want to learn from…

We all need to learn the right shortcuts to take, the right steps to make and the mistakes to avoid along the way… definitely will fast track your success! However, this doesn’t mean you’ll make zero mistakes. Even Gurus and super successful individuals make mistakes (when trying to learn something new), but they learn from their trials, and turn it into a success.

What a great post you’ve here John. Donald Trump is my mentor and I’m so much attached to whatever he does, whether good or bad. I’ve read a couple of his books, but the one that changed my thought pattern is “THINK BIG!”

Thank you for such an amazing book. Truly inspiring and I can’t wait to read his other books.

thank you for sharing your thoughts with us here @ FirePoleMarketing… I also like “Think Big” book.. it’s very inspirational. In fact, all of Donald’s books are inspirational as they are peppered with real life stories and anecdotes — Trump style.